Czech Republic - Our Seventeenth Meal

Well it's been over a year (!!), as we took a break for my pregnancy and the birth of our wonderful son (now 5 months old!), but we are finally BACK with another country date night! Mark picked up again with a delightful meal from the Czech Republic (Czechia, formerly known as Bohemia). Everything was delicious!

The vepřo knedlo zelo (literally, pork roast, dumplings, and sauerkraut) was great! The meat was very tender and the gravy was a hit. Neither Mark nor I normally like sauerkraut, but we both really enjoyed this dish, which had a pleasantly tart flavor, plus bacon, so. The only part we didn't really prefer was the dumplings, which were made with old bread and then steamed, and turned out quite dense -- the only good thing I can say is they would be a frugal food.

A nice fresh salad with a dressing made from white wine vinegar, which I didn't know existed

The kolaches dessert was great. I thought they were reminiscent of hamentaschen, with their different fillings, but with a roll-like bread. Our favorite filling was the cream cheese. Mark said it reminded him of a cheese danish. 

The Becherovka was very nice for sipping -- a warming flavor with notes of ginger and cinnamon. It tasted like it would be good in coffee, or even mulled wine. 

I'm not normally a beer gal, but I've added the beer we drank (Pilsner Urquell, visible in top photo) to my short list of likes (comprised also of Kirin Ichiban, Sapporo, and Corona). It was light and a little sweet almost - not bitter at all. Very nice.

The Czech Republic is the highest consumer of beer and pure alcohol worldwide, so we were in good company with these drinks!!

After dinner we watched Pelíšky (1999), a humorous coming-of-age/slice of life story about two entangled families and romances set at Christmas time in 1967. I know very little of Czech history, though I know a bit more about Russian/Soviet history, so it was interesting to get this snapshot of life in the ČSSR, while under Communist rule as a satellite state of the Soviet Union (from 1960 to 1990). Political tensions and resentment towards the Communist regime figure heavily in the plot. It was also interesting to see the depiction of the apathetic teenagers, who care more about the Beatles and French cinema than about their parents' war stories.

It feels so good to be back at it with our date nights!

When? January 3, 2022

Who cooked? Mark

What's for dinner? (Recipe links) 

Pork; Dumplings; Sauerkraut; Tomato Gravy; Tomato salad; Kolaches; Beer was Pilsner Urquell; Liquor was Brecherovka

The Czech Republic (green) is pretty close to Hungary (orange), which we did previously.

Czech Republic Stats

• Population: 10,738,675 (86th in the world -- about as many people as North Carolina)
• GDP: 47th in the world
• Life Expectancy: 79.1 (36th in the world -- better than the US, which at 78.4 is 40th)
• Founding Date/Age in 2022: Czechoslovakia was formed in 1918, but dissolved in 1993, when the Czech Republic and Slovakia were formed. / 29 years old (younger than me or Mark!). It has been eye-opening to me, through this project, to see how young many countries are. There must be plenty of people in the Czech Republic who have lived in 2 countries during their lifetime, even if they stayed in the same house.
• Official Language: Czech. The film we watched was in Czech, though I thought they were speaking Russian -- apparently the languages are pretty similar!
• Rankings (selected) -- 
• Highest consumption of beer per capita
• Highest consumption of pure alcohol per capita
• Largest poppy seed producer